Nostalgia, displacement, longing and desire to feel in place form the foundation of my current art practice. I work across drawing, video, animation and writing - all resulting from reflections on my place in the land where I 'm living, as well as our complex relationship with the natural world. I see this relationship as my point of departure in understanding our humanity. What I’m interested in representing in my work are landscapes and seascapes that feel distant and remote, possessing a vastness and seeming emptiness that speak of what is “other” to our human world, our dreams, our fears and what is beyond our control. I’m interested in land, the environment, bodies of water, and the politics, histories and narratives when it comes to human relationships with them. I look into texts, testimonies, accounts and disputes when it comes to issues of ownership, rights and access to them, spiritual relevance, lyrical representations, and the narratives about belonging and identity. What motivates me to pursue these topics is my experience and memories of immigrating from coastal environments that have dramatically changed, where some parts no longer exist, and their effect on the psyche.
The medium that I work with mostly is drawing, particularly large drawings, which take a lot of time to execute. In the time that I am making these large drawings, there are many questions about our place, effect and purpose in the natural world that occupy my thoughts. These questions are what propel me to choose drawing as the medium to carry what I feel and think about these subjects. I count on the drawing medium to be a focused and tactile way of representing the patterns and forms found in nature. I use detailed line drawing, size and scale as the means of insisting on the urgency of the subject of the work. The drawings are either 5 by 8 feet, or 5 by 8 inches in size. Through drawing, I’m creating spaces that are vast, yet finite and intimate. I want the viewer to get a sense of either being enveloped and surrounded by this space, or the sense that they can hold it in the palm of their hand.
The medium that I work with mostly is drawing, particularly large drawings, which take a lot of time to execute. In the time that I am making these large drawings, there are many questions about our place, effect and purpose in the natural world that occupy my thoughts. These questions are what propel me to choose drawing as the medium to carry what I feel and think about these subjects. I count on the drawing medium to be a focused and tactile way of representing the patterns and forms found in nature. I use detailed line drawing, size and scale as the means of insisting on the urgency of the subject of the work. The drawings are either 5 by 8 feet, or 5 by 8 inches in size. Through drawing, I’m creating spaces that are vast, yet finite and intimate. I want the viewer to get a sense of either being enveloped and surrounded by this space, or the sense that they can hold it in the palm of their hand.